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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A92855	The nature and danger of heresies, opened in a sermon before the Honourable House of Commons, Ianuary 27. 1646. at Margarets Westminster, being the day of their solemn monthly fast. / By Obadiah Sedgvvick, B.D. Minister of Gods Word at Covent-Garden.	Sedgwick, Obadiah, 1600?-1658.	1647 (1647)	Wing S2377; Thomason E372_13; ESTC R201317	27,115	48

them lay overthrown and cashiered every person in the Trinity All the Scriptures Law and Gospel every distinct morall commandement every particular article of faith every Ordinance of Jesus Christ Preaching of the Word Baptisme Lords Supper c. There are 4. generall heads unto which usually we reduce Christian Religion 1. To the Decalogue of the Law 2. To the symbole of faith 3. To the Lords Prayer 4. To the Sacraments And that learned * See him in ●pusc indice tertio p. 142. c. printed at Geneva M. D. LXXXIII in folio Author doth by name instance the severall hereticall and erreonous teachers who have invaded every one of these and in every particular comprehended in them By all which it doth most clearly appear how dangerously mischievous hereticall opinions are to the Church of God 5. There is one thing more which I would add in the last place by which it shall be manifested that these hereticall opinions are more dangerous then any other flouds and that is a diverse quality in them other flouds are quickly up and quickly down although they grow high and perillous yet there is a suddain transiency in the height and perill their principles are unconstant though violent and being spent these ordinary flouds sink and famish for want of supply and feeding But the flouds of false and erroneous doctrines are such as quickly rise but do very slowly abate They are in this respect worse then the great deluge in the days of Noah which continued many months but then did slack and sink and fell quite away It is not so with hereticall errours but they are like diseases which come upon us flying but goe away from us creeping some erroneous opinions have been kept up for forty years together nay above 100. years together some of them 300. years nay some of the Antichristian heterodoxies have been kept up above a 1000. years together O Brethren men doe extreamly dote upon their own fancies they are exceedingly pleased with their own brats especially with the new conceptions of their own minds they dearly like them and love them and foster them For one Heretique who hath been poysoned in his judicials you may finde a thousand of others converted and reduced who have onely been stained in their morals Heresie or the hereticall opinion is stilted up by all the parts arguments shifts learning of carnall reason and it is born up by an haughty and disdainfull and proud spirit and it is so fallacious and fraudulent when you come to handle it which is not the least it is so rammed in with obstinacy and peremptorinesse that it is almost a miracle to work effectually upon an Heretique Every Heretique is odiously proud All other men who dissent from him are far below him and one saith very truly That no proud man can endure to bee accounted a fool or a knave So simple as to be deceived or so base as to deceive one of which the heretique thinks he must take to his share if at any time he recants his hereticall and seducing doctrine I should now come to shew unto you the reasons why Satan makes use of this dangerous floud against the Church and why especially at some times more then other He well knows that there remains in professing Christians many advantages for him as to erroneous opinions much ignorance much pride and self-conceitednesse much itching vanity much vain glory much fraternall envy much carelesnesse and inadvertency c. but I must wave this and conclude all with some seasonable applications unto our selves Are heresies erroneous and false doctrines such a dangerous Vse 1 and pernicious floud to the Church of God Is there so much sinfulnesse in them so much dishonour to Christ so much injury to the truth of God so much hazard to the immortall souls of men O then what just what sad what singular cause have all of us this day to enlarge our tears and humiliations There are many flouds which doe call for our tears 1. The floud of innocent bloud in Ireland 2. The floud of cries from poore widows and orphans 3. The floud of needy and wounded soldiers and there is yet another floud a worse floud the floud of heresies and blasphemies one deep cals for another the floud of wicked and ungodly opinions doth call earnestly for a floud of sorrow and lamentation We are by Gods mercy and goodnesse indifferently rescued from the cruelty of Dragons O but now we are as much endangered with the floud of the Serpent the bodies of people are in some good measure secured from the edge of the sword but what of this whiles the souls of people are hazarded with the poyson of errours If the danger flies from the body to the soul if the corporall danger be exchanged into a spirituall danger where is our happinesse what is our safety by this Beloved there are 4. notable reasons of our most Note solemn humiliation for the spirituall wickednesses for the false and abominable doctrines which like a floud are now overflowing this Nation 1. The account or height of some of them They amount to no lesse then execrable blasphemies to ignominious contemptuous disgracefull reproaches of God and Christ and the holy Scriptures Beleeve me blasphemy is a daring sin It presseth very close and too sore upon God He that blasphemeth the Name of the Lord he shall surely be put to death Lev. 24 16. The words according to the originall are Hee that strikes through the Name of Jehovah Blasphemy is that bold sword which is hacking of God himself which is as it were cleaving of him asunder The School-men tell us that blasphemy breaks out 3. ways 1. Cùm attribuitur Deo quod ei non convenit when we affirm that of God which is unbeseeming of God which is incompatible with his holy and divine Nature As to make him a creature or a lyer or cruell unjust unmercifull sinfull or the cause of sin 2. Cum à Deo removetur quod ei convenit when we deny that to God which indeed belongs to God It is called blasphemy in the King of Assyria when he said that the Lord was not able to deliver Hierusalem out of his hand 2 Chron. 32. 17. 3. Cum attribuitur creaturae quod Deo appropriatur when we put that upon a creature which is proper to God Thus when the Israelites had made a molten Calf and said This is thy God that brought thee up out of Aegypt it is added and they wrought great provocations Nehem 9. 18. In the Hebrew it is and they committed great blasphemies Now compare this short discourse of the kindes of blasphemies with the many expressions let fall in the speeches of some and set down in the writings of others and then judge whether some of our moderne errours rise not as high as blasphemy Viz. 1. That God is the Author of sin Not onely of the actions unto which sinne doth cleave but of the very

Christ onely 3. If the erroneous opinion be against any one particular doctrinall necessary truth even that particular errour will amount to heresie Indeed number if I may so speak is requisite to apostasie but any particular necessity of a truth to our salvation if opposed is sufficient for heresie The Apostate turns his back from the whole truth the Heretique grapples vvith some truth but denies other truth And therefore though a person still retaines an assent consonant to many truths nay to most truths nay to all except one necessary truth yet if his erroneous opinion be subversive of that one his errour will come to heresie 4. To make the erroneous opinion to be hereticall it is necessary as to the person who holds it that he be a professed Christian one who is vinculo fidei obstrictus as some doe word it It is a question put by Schoolmen and others whether Infidels Pagans and Jews who hold opinions contrary unto and subversive of the faith are to be reputed Heretiques Unto which it is answered that one may be styled hereticall either 1. Materially as when his opinion for the matter and substance of it is contrary to the faith and subverting of the foundation 2. Or else formally as when not only the substance of the opinion is hereticall and opposite to the Christian faith but also it is maintained by one who hath formerly engaged himself to the profession and maintenance of the faith In the former consideration Infidels and Jews may bee reputed Heretiques but in this latter consideration onely he is so to be reputed who was reckoned amongst the number of Christians professing the faith If the Infidel and Jew deny Jesus Christ to be a Saviour of sinners though this be a great sin yet it is not strictly considered an heresie because neither the one nor the other ever embraced or professed the Gospel But if a Christian professing the Gospel doth this in him it is heresie 5. But lastly to make up heresie there must be obstinacy or pertinacy joyned with that erroneous opinion which is contrary to the faith He who is an Heretique must adhere or inhere he must obstinately adhere or cleave unto his erroneous opinion I confesse that it is a very quick case Whether pertinacy be so essentiall to heresie that the opinion cannot at all be reputed hereticall unlesse the professing Christian who holds it appear obstinate Concerning which case I will onely deliver my opinion submitting it to better judgements that where the erroneous opinion doth ex natura opinionis appear grosly and notoriously exitious to the rasing of the foundation it is hereticall A denying of Jesus Christ to bee the Son of God or a denying of salvation by him such an opinion in the very nature of it is pernicious ruinous and damnable yet ad plurimum and in the ordinary way of discovery and processe with Heretiques I humbly conceive that pertinacy must be an ingredient to constitute the person to be heretically erroneous And therefore in this point of Heresie and Heretiques Divines doe distinguish inter Infidelem and dubium in fide and Haeretico credentem Haereticum There is Infidelis one who never entertained or professed the faith yet is obstinately and most violently carried against it This man may be a persecutor but he is not an Heretique notwithstanding his opinion and notwithstanding his obstinacy Again there is dubius in fide one who is doubtfull in the faith one who is wavering and reeling anceps fluctuans his anchor doth not fasten he is not quite on nor quite off but staggers and totters the equall apprehensions of truth and falshood doe so poise and ballance the one against the other that he comes not up fully and determinately any way Now although some doe affirm that even dubius in fide is Haereticus yet I dare not to assert it Thomas the Apostle did dubitare in fide he was Incredulus yet surely not Haereticus Indeed as Austine speaks he who doth dubitare doth errare for the man doth erre who approves falshood for truth or disallows truth for falshood or takes uncertain things for certain truths or certain truths for uncertain conjectures errour here is but not heresie There is also Haeretico-credens one who is rowled up wrigled in packt up into a dangerous errour misled seduced follows his leader holds that which really is contrary to the faith and destructive yet not out of obstinacy of minde but upon an imagination of truth not out of deliberation but by surreption he is utterly deceived by taking upon trust his erroneous opinion is not fortified with pertinacy but only crept into him by his simplicity And therefore being candidly dealt with and being admonished he contends not but yeelds and wheels about to the truth as the bow when the string is taken off returns to its own posture again so upon admonition the seduced person quits his errour and submits to the faith But then there is Haereticus the very Heretique and he is one who doth not only malè sentire erre in his opinion but also doth fortiter tenere obstinately maintain that errour he doth not onely hold fidei oppositum that which is contrary to the faith but also he doth hold the same animo opponendi with a pertinacious spirit There is in him definiendi temeritas tuendi perversitas too But here now fals in that difficult and knotty question namely when a person is to be reputed obstinate or pertinacious in holding an errour contrary to the faith The Apostle I think resolves us in this where he saith An Heretique after the first and second admonition reject So then when Titus 3. 10. there is a due proposall of the truth manifestly revealed in the Scriptures and yet the erroneous person adheres unto his errour our of a very pravity of mind and will not suffer his understanding to be captivated unto the truth this person is pertinacious in holding of his erroneous opinion and is manifestly an Heretique Beloved when an erroneous person maintains his opinion contrary to clear light so that he must necessarily deny the truth of God or revoke his error or when he cannot maintain his wicked errour but he must necessarily overthrow some other article of faith which yet he would not doe or when the person cares not to trample down another truth to uphold his error against a former truth makes one article a footstool to pull down another or when the person steps from one errour to a more grosse one cares not what errour he plungeth himself into so that he may maintain his errour or when all solid reason is silenced nay if reason and conscience might speak they doe concurring with the truth against his errour secretly condemn him and having nothing to reply hee fals unto proud scorns bitter virulencies miserable shifts surely such an erroneous person is obstinate and pertinacious in his corrupt opinion And thus briefly for the